I took the brick-paved road to Calumet
where the stone church always looks empty,
even in daylight, that lonely red door
like your starburnt eye.
Who keeps You company these days?
And is it enough?
I sat on the steps, deciding where to go
while the sun fell lower in the sky.
If I find you, I'll tell you
what I really think of this place
that feels like hollow ground
everywhere I am.
20090417
.the.great.golf.course.sham.
Going to a boarding school, I lived with relentless parietal rules, which, for the most part didn't bother me, since I wasn't getting any for most of the time. There were all sorts of tactics around it, and everyone knew them all. Some people just knew better than others which were legends, and what was strategm.
My friend Charlie and I spent an evening walking around the campus golf course, searching for couples in compromising positions. That was the sexual hot spot on campus, allegedly, the lover's lookout. Needless to say, we found no one. Was everyone perceptive enough, devious enough, to avoid detection? Were we not being thorough enough? Or was it all a ruse?
Most people, I think, ended up just breaking parietals, sneaking themselves up to dorm rooms and hoping for the best. And truth be told, the duty masters didn't really end up being all too investigative most of the time. I mean, maybe they saw it from our perspective, as an isolated population of teenagers living in dorms. Maybe they had sympathy. Maybe they realized how futile it would have been.
There were cases, of course, where the administration did have to crack down and lay down the law. It was generally once a year. The most vivid memory was my last year, in which a pair of students had secretly installed a webcam in a dorm-mate's room, and when said dorm-mate snuck his girlfriend upstairs, the hankypanky was captured on film. A fifth person ended up ratting out the two filmographers out of his "good conscience". We all suspected ulterior motives of furthering his house-political profile.
All parties were busted: the filmographers, and the lusty lovers. Lawyers were called in. Students were kicked out and reprimanded. Administrative emails from the Dean of Students most likely still linger in a few people's inboxes, gathering mildew, and decomposing into the ether of the internet. Nobody I know of ever saw the video.
I, myself, did have occasion, during a less than well-remembered relationship, to experiment with breaking parietals and doing afterdark explorations of campus. I had my fair share of close calls and times being caught red-handed. Nothing nearly as spectacular as any of the aforementioned scenarios, but a learning experience nonetheless. Perhaps one of the more important lessons learned by a majority of the student population there.
And you can imagine how bizarre it was to go to college, living on campus, and finding that for the most part, nobody really gave a shit what you did or where. Roommates being caught became the stuff of college comedy, commonly commanding it's own code of ettiquette. Did it demystify and deromanticize the entire experience of slinking around a dark campus? of sneaking around rooms with doors considerably less than 90 degrees ajar?
Don't ask me. I certainly wasn't getting any my freshman year.
But for a moment last night, I felt that old knowledge come back to me: the mental notes of which buildings were open late, how to sneak around dark hallways into even darker classrooms, how to lay low when we heard the sweeping of the janitor in the hallway outside, singing a song to herself.
My friend Charlie and I spent an evening walking around the campus golf course, searching for couples in compromising positions. That was the sexual hot spot on campus, allegedly, the lover's lookout. Needless to say, we found no one. Was everyone perceptive enough, devious enough, to avoid detection? Were we not being thorough enough? Or was it all a ruse?
Most people, I think, ended up just breaking parietals, sneaking themselves up to dorm rooms and hoping for the best. And truth be told, the duty masters didn't really end up being all too investigative most of the time. I mean, maybe they saw it from our perspective, as an isolated population of teenagers living in dorms. Maybe they had sympathy. Maybe they realized how futile it would have been.
There were cases, of course, where the administration did have to crack down and lay down the law. It was generally once a year. The most vivid memory was my last year, in which a pair of students had secretly installed a webcam in a dorm-mate's room, and when said dorm-mate snuck his girlfriend upstairs, the hankypanky was captured on film. A fifth person ended up ratting out the two filmographers out of his "good conscience". We all suspected ulterior motives of furthering his house-political profile.
All parties were busted: the filmographers, and the lusty lovers. Lawyers were called in. Students were kicked out and reprimanded. Administrative emails from the Dean of Students most likely still linger in a few people's inboxes, gathering mildew, and decomposing into the ether of the internet. Nobody I know of ever saw the video.
I, myself, did have occasion, during a less than well-remembered relationship, to experiment with breaking parietals and doing afterdark explorations of campus. I had my fair share of close calls and times being caught red-handed. Nothing nearly as spectacular as any of the aforementioned scenarios, but a learning experience nonetheless. Perhaps one of the more important lessons learned by a majority of the student population there.
And you can imagine how bizarre it was to go to college, living on campus, and finding that for the most part, nobody really gave a shit what you did or where. Roommates being caught became the stuff of college comedy, commonly commanding it's own code of ettiquette. Did it demystify and deromanticize the entire experience of slinking around a dark campus? of sneaking around rooms with doors considerably less than 90 degrees ajar?
Don't ask me. I certainly wasn't getting any my freshman year.
But for a moment last night, I felt that old knowledge come back to me: the mental notes of which buildings were open late, how to sneak around dark hallways into even darker classrooms, how to lay low when we heard the sweeping of the janitor in the hallway outside, singing a song to herself.
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